Naming names

Em and Mark are thinking about baby names. They've decided upon a lovely name for a girl, but haven't decided upon one yet for a boy. What a daunting task. It's not like choosing the perfect crib or the best diaper service. A name sticks with you forever, and in some ways I believe it even influences how others relate to you. So I guess I'd nix the stripper names and the cutesy spellings. Like so the names of old men (this is personal: I'd have trouble bouncing a "Milton" on my knee) and the names of cities (remember the trend of naming a child for the place he was conceived?). When Curt and I were expecting Em, we knew for certain that if we had a boy, we'd name him Christopher Ernest, so he'd have the same initials as my husband (and his middle name would be after my Dad). We had no clue what we would name a girl until I was well into my ninth month of pregnancy. We hadn't considered the name Emily before that, but when we finally did, we knew we'd found perfection. And I never liked the name Peoria anyway.

Super saver

Sometimes I think I save way too many things, just because I am overly sentimental. Yesterday I took out the box marked, "Emily, 1977," so I could put it aside to show Em and Mark when they come to visit over the holidays. Inside was every card and letter we received congratulating us on her birth, as well as our wrist bands from the hospital and the little pink nameplate that was on her hospital basinet ("Baby Olson,") and one tiny baby shoe from the outfit we brought her home in. The rush of memories was well worth the storage of a few extra boxes of mementos, I've decided. It's not like I'm a hoarder or anything...

PS. This week the baby is the size of an heirloom tomato!!

Not fair game

I watched a perfect stranger walk up to a pregnant woman today and touch her belly without even asking, "May I please touch your belly even though I'm a perfect stranger?" I remembered how I disliked it when that happened to me. I also disliked all the unsolicited advice I got while pregnant with Em. "You're not getting big enough...you're getting too big...you're how far along?...don't drink skimmed milk; the baby needs fat!...your breasts will never be the same (maybe better??)..." and on and on. Sometimes it made me cry, probably because I didn't have the gumption to tell people to back off at the tender age of 22. I try to be very respectful of Em's body and her feelings, though I did catch myself a couple of times with hands midair heading straight for her tummy like it was community property. How dare I.  On the upside, strangers tend to be very polite with pregnant women, holding doors and offering their seats. That's nice.

Laugh or cry

Em and Mark visited the midwife a couple of days ago and heard their baby's heartbeat for the very first time. Mark video- and audio-taped the whole event, and we were able to share in this very intimate moment. Em said that the pregnancy suddenly became very real for her when she heard the first quick thumps, and I couldn't help remembering when I first heard my own child's heartbeat. All these years later I am still astounded by the profundity of it all. The urgency of the unmistakable sound assures me that this precious work in progress has lots to do and no time to waste.

Tell it like it is

Expecting, in a family way, preggers, with child, swallowed a watermelon seed, bun in the oven. Most of the euphemisms for "pregnant" seem patriarchal, sexually repressed or silly.